The Great Powers in Life

We went to an early season long course senior development meet this weekend. You know the kind of meet; everyone is in the midst of training, no one is placing much importance on the results of this meet - except they look at the scoreboard for their time! - And then evaluate their swim based largely upon that time. Swimmers are both blessed and cursed by the stopwatch; if the time is fast then it is a "good" swim; if it is not so fast then it is a "bad" swim. What is our collective and individual obsession about the stopwatch? Where did we "learn" that fast = good and slow = bad?

We keep talking with our team about attitude. We believe our greatest power in life is our power to choose. And with this power comes responsibility. We are actually responsible and accountable for who we are. We can choose - as a swimmer - to be fast or slow; enthused about training or not; eager to improve our kick power or not; the list is endless. We can choose - as a person - to be successful or not; to be energetic or lazy; to be well educated or not; the list is endless.

Special "thanks and a shout out" to fellow coach Craig who inspired this week's blog. You are doing a great job; keep it up!! The quote we talked about is below...

Attitude

by Charles Swindoll

The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life.

Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company ... a church ... a home.

The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past. We cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable.
The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude ... I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me, and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you ... we are in charge of our Attitudes.